


a promise

by taass64



Category: Starsky & Hutch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-09
Updated: 2015-05-09
Packaged: 2018-03-29 16:19:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3902770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taass64/pseuds/taass64
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a promise is a promise</p>
            </blockquote>





	a promise

**Author's Note:**

> This is a prompt fic in answer to:  
> prompt fic week 27, LJ S&H community  
> Duluth's prompt: Starsky + Hutch; to you I bequeath my cah

Hutch closed his magazine and placed it on the stair beside him. He squinted up at the springtime sun beaming down bright and hot on Starsky’s driveway and slipped out of his flannel shirt. The tee shirt underneath was damp with sweat. He wished he was wearing cut-offs like Starsky was. He would have had he known he’d be waiting this long.

“How much longer you gonna be, Starsk?” Hutch had to yell over Starsky’s rendition of “Blueberry Hill” and his hose’s powerful water jet slamming against the Torino. He got up, smoothing his jeans and walked toward where Starsky was rinsing his car.

“What’s the rush? We got all day,” Starsky answered as he dropped the hose and pulled a sponge out of a big bucket of soapy water. The nozzle hit the ground with a clank and shot a spurt of water directly at Hutch’s crotch.

Hutch jumped back as the cold hit him. “Hey, watch it!”

Starsky looked over at him and smirked. “Couldn’t have planned that better if I tried, huh?”

“Very funny.” Hutch tried to be mad, but Starsky was beaming that smile of his, the one Hutch knew was a reflection of his happiest, most playful self. The one he never could resist. Best of all, the one he knew meant Kira and all she represented was behind them. “And anyway, didn’t I just watch you soap the whole car up then rinse it off again?”

“That was the preliminary wash, just getting grime off. Now’s when I really clean her.” Starsky turned his attention back to the Torino and began at the roofline rubbing small circles with the soapy sponge. “Geez, Hutch. Don’t you know nothin’ about washin’ a car? Wait, never mind. Of course you don’t. I never seen you wash your car whole time I’ve known you. Besides, your rust bucket is held together with dirt. You washed it, probably fall apart!”

Deciding to take advantage of Starsky’s soaping intensity, Hutch picked up the hose. “That so?” He asked, turning the nozzle to face Starky and switching the setting to the most powerful jet.

Starsky must have sensed the danger. He turned around slowly. But his conviction didn’t waver. “You dare to disagree, Partner?”

  
“I don’t have to dare to do anything. I’m the one with the hose.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I would.”

Starsky threw the sponge at Hutch’s head. It sent Hutch off balance a moment, enough that by the time he recovered Starsky’s hands were on the hose. They both got soaked as they laughed hysterically and fought for control of the weapon. Starsky wrapped a leg around Hutch’s to knock him over and before long they were both on the ground in an all-out wrestle for power. Hutch realized the bucket of soapy water was within his reach and he managed to dump it over, completely drenching them both, but surprising Starsky enough that he was able to wrench the nozzle away. He held it up out of Starsky’s reach, claiming victory.

“Got it!” Hutch tried to stand and continue the battle, but succumbed to the weakness the laughter had left him with. Besides, it felt too good just enjoying Starsky again. He didn’t want to move.

“Hutch?” Starsky asked between giggles.

“Hmm?”

“What was that for?”

“Just felt like it. Truce?”

“Truce.” Starsky answered, and they shook on it.

“Go ahead, teach me about washing cars. I’ll listen.”

Neither moved to get up. Hutch wondered what the neighbors were thinking, two of them laying in the driveway, him holding a hose, both of them soaked and soapy. But then again. He didn’t care.

  
“S’alright, Hutch. S’pose you never had to work for a car like I had to. Work three jobs, bagging groceries, cuttin’ lawns, delivering newspapers, plus working for my Uncle Al all just to scrimp and save for a piece of junk even he couldn’t sell.“

“Nope. My first car was my dad’s Mercedes,” Hutch answered. “He’d grown out of it, ready for the latest model. And before you say it, you’re right. I hated it.”

“I always loved cars. Used to be my job to wash ‘em at the car lot. Had to be clean so they could be sold. Used to pretend the good ones were mine. Dreamed about where they’d take me. Never really had a nice car I loved till now. Guess that’s why I’m so hung up on her.”

“I get it, Starsk. And you’re right. I never had to want for a car, but my father would threaten to break my legs if I so much as scratched the Mercedes. All I ever wanted was a car I didn’t have to worry about.”

“Thus your genuine Hutchinson originals.” Hutch could hear the grin in Starsky’s voice.

“I like a car you don’t care gets a scratch.”

They were both quiet a while. Hutch pondered the particular irony of their backgrounds. As if reading his mind, Starsky said, “Boy, were we raised in the wrong households, huh?”

“Hey Hutch?” Starsky asked.

“Yeah?”

“Since we’re on the subject of cars, I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

“Anything.”

“Well, I was thinkin’, if anything, I mean, if… well, if something happens to me, I want you to have my car.”

“Starsk.”

“I mean it, Hutch. You take her. Take care of her for me, huh?”

Hutch was sure that the very last thing he’d be thinking of if anything happened to Starsky was his car. Hutch was at a loss for words. In light of the conversation they’d just had, he couldn’t possibly tell Starsky he wouldn’t take care of the Torino. But how could he live with, how could he love, a big red reminder of what he’d lost?

“Starsk, can we talk about something else?”

“You’ll do that for me, right Hutch?”

“Don’t you think you’re being a bit macabre for such a sunny day?”

“We have to talk about this stuff, Hutch. You know one of us could get burned any time.”

Hutch struggled to answer. “If it’s that important to you, yes.” Then feeling it necessary to lighten things back up again, he added, “But you have to promise to do the same thing for me. You have to keep my car!”

Hutch got the reaction he wanted when Starsky grabbed the hose back and the water fight resumed in full force.

Eventually Hutch ended up helping Starsky wash the Torino. Later, they changed out of their wet clothes and drove a bright and shiny car up the coast, settling on the beach to watch the sunset with sandwiches and beer. Hutch thought it was one of the best afternoons they’d ever shared.

______________________

The shattered windows and bullet holes brought tears to his eyes. The blood spatter nearly dropped him where he stood. Before his world ended completely there was something he needed to do.

He approached her and put his hand out, touching her gently, as if she could feel the pain, too. With his throat too tight to make it above a whisper, he spoke to her. “It was a promise I didn’t want to make. But I made it. So I’ll take care of you. I’ll fix you up, I’ll even love you if that’s what it takes. But only so he can make it, and take you back again. Because this is a promise I’m just not ready to keep.”


End file.
